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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24797632">A Sad Man’s Tale</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/TwistedViolets/pseuds/TwistedViolets'>TwistedViolets</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Umbrella Academy (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Blood, Dad!Klaus, Drug Use, Homelessness, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Klaus Hargreeves Deserves Better, Old timey internet, Pictures, Prostitution, Protective Diego Hargreeves, Stealing</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 00:21:42</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,249</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24797632</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/TwistedViolets/pseuds/TwistedViolets</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Klaus left the Academy and didn’t know where to go from there. Except down, up, sideways, and somewhere along the way he had a child. Which direction that is exactly has yet to be determined.</p><p>Or-</p><p>Klaus a druggie homeless and way too free for his own good man ends up with a child. Children cost money, something he doesn’t have.</p><p>So he does what he has to.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>101</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Sad Man’s Tale</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This is just an old draft of a thing I was working on.</p><p>I looked over this once but I’ve had a bad day so I probably did a garbage job of checking it. Sorry!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Klaus didn't know what to do when he left the Academy. He had ideas, of course, foolish huge ideas. He's a man bigger than life after all and he thought he could do the limelight.</p><p>He tried to get into modeling. It was fine, for a time being. For a few under the table dollars in dark alleyways. It worked until the pictures got more scandalous and he couldn't.</p><p>Not pictures.</p><p>He'd do other things though. He'd touch, he'd spread his legs, and his mouth soon became aquatinted with so many foreign objects it's hard to count them all and of course his ways would come to bite him. It always does.

It happened, on a cold and windy night when he had just wanted to sleep but instead, he was stuck working the corner because he couldn't hack the $50 motel fee.

</p><p>A regular client walked up. A rare one, out of twenty she was the only female and well, she had a baby in her arms, that high blown outlook and when she told him those words, he almost laughed.</p><p>"It's yours."</p><p>So stupid. Klaus knew it couldn't have been his. He's so fucked up he doubts his sperm even worked.</p><p>"It has your eyes," Ben said beside him, peering at the small baby. And yeah, if he was honest with himself he'd agree.</p><p>But he knew he couldn't take the baby, the responsibility, so he told her off and that was that. Didn't hear from her for four long years, four years off skipping from dumpsters to motels to rehab and then back on the streets to work when he found someone desperate enough to accept his used body.</p><p>He never found anything worthwhile. Never found a lover aside from flings, never found a home that he could stay in and feel safe, and never was he sober enough to even remember that baby.</p><p>Perhaps he was running away from the truth. Maybe in the back of his mind, he knew and he wanted to prove something to himself. He's a fuck up and doesn't deserve a child, right?</p><p>It worked. He felt that way. He, god, the thought of even having a child made him weary. Where would he keep it? Who would watch it? How would he provide for it if he couldn't provide for himself?</p><p>He didn't ponder these questions. Never really thought it'd ever come to that but it did. Of course it did and he wasn't prepared.</p><p>Wasn't prepared for Diego to drag him out of a dumpster, demanding to know why Klaus never told he had a kid. If he's honest with himself he knows it's because if he said it it'd be real.</p><p>He'd really be a dad.</p><p>"She-Blake overdosed. They called me because they couldn't get a hold of your junkie ass. God Klaus how are they ever going to give you that child when you look like this?"</p><p>"Like what?" He hissed out instead of 'what if I don't want it.'</p><p>"Like a goddam crack head, Klaus."</p><p>He knew his brother was right. He knew he was into bad shit, the shit that messes with your head, and he knew that shit made him forget too.</p><p>So he shrugged his shoulders.</p><p>His brother dragged him to a nearby gym, ripped his clothes off, and hosed him with the showerhead. "You smell like you haven't bathed for years. Cat piss and shit and god how do you live like this?"</p><p>Klaus lives sure, but he doesn't experience. He doesn't experience happiness and love, he experiences blackouts and days without feeling a goddamn thing and he loves it.</p><p>When they finally make it to the hospital to pick up his kid. His son, he supposes, he itches at his skin just underneath the suit Diego forced on him. He feels dirty, not dirty dirty, but like he's going to make this kid dirty.</p><p>"I should just go home. Let it become a foster child or something-"</p><p>"Absolutely not, Klaus," Diego told him, hand on his shoulder. "You're going to be a great dad. After you sober up, I have some faith in that at least."</p><p>"At least one of us does," he muttered, watching each turning of the surrounding peoole’s head as he made his way to the back. Where his child has been waiting patiently to meet him. </p><p>These doctors who are staring at him, these rampant nurses who are glaring. He wondered what they must think and somewhere deep down he knew. They were all looking at him like 'hope he's not the dad,' 'kid must have it rough, having two druggies as parents.'</p><p>He knew and it hurt.</p><p>Hurt so badly that he's sure he suffered heartburn.</p><p>Then the doctor spouted something to him, asking him questions he didn't quite register but Diego did. So that's all that matters, his brother got his back.</p><p>He just couldn't focus, not when just beyond a single glass panel was his child. He knew, he could almost sense it, and his mouth tasted so sour as he fought with the anxiety bubbling in his stomach. He didn't know if he could do it, he didn't know...and he wanted to back out.</p><p>He wanted to call it quits, tell them there's no fucking way he could do this but he didn't have time. The doctor opened the door and gestured for him and Diego to step inside.</p><p>There on a small blue leather couch, wrapped in a stripped thin blanket, was his child. Dark curly hair, eyes closed, small snores, and his skin so tan. He felt like he might cry.</p><p>"Are you good?" Diego asked him, touching his arm gently.</p><p>"Yeah, course-" his voice cracks, his cheeks were wet, and he felt so stupid.</p><p>So stupid running away from this, from this innocence he was worried about tainting. Of course he was, he still is, but now looking at his son, his child he doesn't even know, he feels like he wasted so much time.</p><p>So much time of being a dead beat dad.</p><p>This kid deserves so much better.</p><p>"His name is Connor," the doctor said sweetly, handing him a box of tissues.</p><p>He accepted them.</p><p>...</p><p>He didn't know what to think of Connor. The child was small, thin, a little too thin if you asked him. He knew Connor must not have been eating well and he wanted to change that.</p><p>The only problem was money.</p><p>He's broke. Horribly broke and that was always fine. When it was just him. </p><p>"Do you have somewhere to stay?" Diego asked him...and it sounded sincere but Klaus didn't want to be a burden.</p><p>He knew he should have said no. He should have let Diego baby him, take care of him, but he didn't.</p><p>"Yes, a hotel up the street." </p><p>"If you need anything, let me know," Diego said as he dropped them off there, waving at Connor as he did. The child said nothing, did nothing, was utterly cold.</p><p>Which he might have been concerned about but their new. They are strangers yet, and it's to be expected.</p><p>"Should I call you dad?" Connor asked him and Klaus took off his scarf and wrapped it gently already Connor's neck.</p><p>"You don't have to," he said, tucking the scarf in closer. It gets cold at night.</p><p>"Okay," Connor’s hand came up to hold the scarf closer to him. "Thank you..."</p><p>It wasn't good. None this was good for Connor, for this child he saved from a home of crack head, and well Klaus isn't much different. But he was understanding at least, no matter how bad Connor's mother was...she was still his mother and the child deserved to be sad about it, even if he didn't quite understand it.</p><p>"When's my mother coming back?" The child asked him, huddling closer to him beside the dumpster. He felt terrible because of the fact the child was so used to this meant that his mother probably put him through this same shit.</p><p>He's so sorry.</p><p>"She isn't...you see up there?" He gestures to the night-sky, huddling even closer. Connor nods. "Your mommy went there, to heaven, that's where good people go when they die."</p><p>"Oh," Connor said, eyes fluttering shut, and as he leaned into him, head rolling to the side, a small bruise appeared on his neck and it made his stomach roll.</p><p>He felt terrible.</p><p>"Go tell Diego you lied," Ben told him, looking concerned. "Please Klaus you can't do this to him. He deserves better."</p><p>"Well I don't have better," Klaus hisses, tears already formed by the time he spoke. "This is all I got, this I all I've ever had. Don't you think I know he deserves better? I'm...I'm going to figure something out."</p><p>Ben swallowed, despite not needing to, and he looked at him so deeply that Klaus just wanted to push him. Slap him, hit him, tell him to stop judging him, stop making this so goddamn hard on him.</p><p>But Ben doesn't.</p><p>Ben just keeps staring.</p><p>He knows he deserves it. He's being selfish. Letting his own child live on the streets with him while Diego offered better. But...he didn't want to risk Diego being thrown out, he couldn't ruin his brother's life.</p><p>He couldn't.</p><p>He just couldn't.</p><p>He'll figure something out. He'll do something. This is the last day, no more living on the streets. He'll get a job, he'll go to a shelter he'll do something.</p><p>He bit his lip until blood bubbled up and dripped down his chin and it takes him a moment to lick it up, caught up in thought.</p><p>...</p><p>He stopped by the library the next day, out of the rain that had begun and into a nice warmth. Connor idly picked at a few books but didn't really look at the words, probably until able to even understand the basic alphabet.</p><p>Of course, Klaus knew he was too young for that but watching it seemed so innocent. Made him look so cute and small and really made Klaus realize how little he truly was.</p><p>He got on a computer, big and bulky and slow. He never really liked them but they did have newspapers he could read and well he was job searching, or at least he was before he got distracted.</p><p>Distracted on streaming sites, low quality, grainy women smiling, promising deeds, and well he considered that as a job, he did, but he thought he could do better for his son.</p><p>Or well, maybe that was the last of the drugs talking. He's working to sobriety but it's a rough road and who's to blame him if he needs a little extra extra to get through the day.</p><p>"Don't wander off," he yelled to Connor who looked over to him, curls jumping, and he nodded.</p><p>He kept going down the site and he came across something that made his blood curl up and turn to ice in his veins. There were pictures of the Umbrella Academy, of him. Of younger him, posing, offering out some part of himself like his lips or his chest or a few times his navel. </p><p>And he noticed the button at the top, reading 'bid.' This is an auction. People are buying these pictures- and it hit him and he knew then.</p><p>He could do that.</p><p>He could...couldn't he?</p><p>He gathered up Connor and left, his big cold hand around his small warm one. "Are we sleeping outside again? I don't like the bugs."</p><p>"Yes...but not for much longer," he said and he meant it. He wouldn't let them sleep outside, he wouldn't let them go hungry.</p><p>"This isn't a good idea," Ben told him but Ben was never right.</p><p>...</p><p>He bought a camera.</p><p>Stuffed it in his coat and made small talk with the owner of the pawnshop before leaving. The owner didn't suspect a thing. </p><p>Just a dad with his son.</p><p>...</p><p>His first pictures weren't great. He put the camera on a dumpster, told Connor to look away, and he pulled up his shirt and grinned to the camera, at the moment his teeth nics his scab on his lip and blood drips down his lips.</p><p>He still smiled and the camera flashed and the picture was taken. He knew it wasn't that great, he knew it but he needed money.</p><p>This isn't bad. It's just a few pictures. It'll just be one or two until he gets a proper job.</p><p>That's what he thought when he took the picture. Then he made a nice account, uploaded to picture, and then he watched people bid like crazy. The chatting bar full of people writing, asking questions.</p><p>
  <i>Who took this picture? Is this one new? God, he's so hot! Isn't he that Umbrella Academy kid? Fuck, look at the blood. Are those bruises on his stomach? Wish there was more blood...I'd pay for that.</i>
</p><p>The bid finished at a thousand dollars and the money was automatically transferred to a bank account he had over drawn $500 in.</p><p>Just one or two pictures he said but he lied. He always lies.</p><p>That night when he bought them a room and gave Connor a handful of snacks from the vending machine he felt good. Better than he had in years and for once he could smile about something good.</p><p>
  <i>Wish there was more blood...I’d pay for that.</i>
</p><p>He can make that happen.</p>
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